In the related art, a shift-by-wire type shift apparatus, which electrically switches a shift state based on a shift operation performed by an occupant (driver), is known (for example, see JP 2013-194855A (Reference 1)).
A shift control apparatus (the shift apparatus) including an actuator that is operated based on a control signal corresponding to the shift operation performed by the occupant and a shift switching mechanism (shift switching member) that switches a shift position by being driven by the actuator is disclosed in Reference 1. In the shift control apparatus described in Reference 1, four fitting sections (valley sections) are continued at an edge of a detent plate. Then, a leading end portion of a detent spring is fitted into one fitting section together with rotation of the detent plate by the actuator and thereby the shift position corresponding to the fitting section is established. Moreover, a wall section having an inclined angle at which the leading end portion of the detent spring cannot climb over is provided in the fitting sections (valley sections) of both end portions. Thus, after a rotation starting point of the detent plate is set by pressing the leading end portion of the detent spring against the wall section of the detent plate, the detent plate is configured to be rotated to a position corresponding to each shift position by a rotational angle that is set in advance.
However, in the shift control apparatus (shift apparatus) of Reference 1, whenever the leading end portion of the detent spring is pressed against the wall section of the detent plate by rotating the detent plate, a lock torque is generated in the actuator. In addition, an excessive pressing force is applied to both the wall section of the detent plate and the leading end portion of the detent spring together with generation of the lock torque. Thus, there is a problem in that durability of the actuator and the shift switching mechanism is lowered according to the learning of the rotation starting point of the detent plate being repeatedly performed. In addition, since the detent plate is rotated to the position corresponding to each shift position by the rotational angle that is set in advance after learning of the rotation starting point, there is a problem that the leading end portion of the detent spring is not accurately fitted into a valley bottom of each fitting section and positioning accuracy of each shift position is lowered due to individual differences (manufacturing errors and the like) of each shift apparatus.